Teaching engineering in a way that gets undergraduates excited about profession and
prepares them for the practice of engineering. Bring experiences as a practicing engineer
into the classroom and to show students that engineering is a meaningful, rewarding
profession.

Allowing students to reflect on the critical role that engineers play in shaping society
and how the study of engineering can lead to opportunities to make a difference in
the world.

Project and design skills are important, however the focus on learning to solve one
type of problem then moving on to another does not reflect engineering practice. In
practice, a design problem is a system of interconnected, multi-disciplinary sub-
problems. Information is usually “soft” and problem constraints are often not well
defined. Problem solving in this environment requires creativity and intuition that
are best learned through experience. Students should develop these skills by working
on open-ended problems for which there is no “right” answer but which require students
to search among assumptions and solution methods for the best answer that they can
find.

The majority of engineering graduates move into industry upon graduation. An important
role of the engineering professor is to help students learn the skills that they need
to be comfortable and confident in an industrial setting. This means that a student
should have a strong background in engineering science; it also means that students
should be literate in the language of mechanical engineering, capable of using the
tools of the trade, and confident in their communication skills. I work to maintain
strong ties to industry and to act as a bridge between the academic world and the
industrial world. I actively solicit input and project problems from industrial sources
and find opportunities for students to present their work to practicing engineers.
This involvement exposes students to the components, processes and solution methods
that make up the practicing engineer’s toolbox.

Research and Professional Interests

Recently, my students and I have worked on a project to capture and analyze myoelectric
signals that are generated in the muscles of the forearm when a series of different
hand gestures are performed. This work has potential application in the development
of relatively simple, inexpensive controls for powered, upper-limb prosthetics. Recent
improvements in the functionality of powered prosthetics have lead to an increase
in their use for upper-limb amputees. Prosthetics that are currently available require
the use of a secondary input device such as a smartphone with a suitable app in order
to generate different hand gestures. Primary control of these devices is accomplished
using a single pair of surface electrodes that are in contact with the user’s residual
limb. The signal from this pair of electrodes is sufficient to actuate the prosthesis,
however it is not yet possible to differentiate between intended hand gestures using
this signal alone. Other researchers have had some success in gesture differentiation
using an array of several electrode pairs positioned over the users’ upper body. Others
have used an array of electrodes that are surgically implanted into the user’s residual
limb and upper body. These approaches are promising, however they are unwieldy and
expensive, and in the latter case involve invasive surgery. The goal of our research
is to maximize the information that is extracted from the signal generated by a single
electrode pair. To date, we have constructed an apparatus to capture the raw signal
from the electrodes at the instant the test subject performs a hand gesture. We have
collected many signals that were generated using a set of four different hand gestures
and we have analyzed them in both the time and frequency domains.

I am currently working on a project to design, prototype and patent an automobile
repair safety system. This project started when I was approached by a local business
owner who sells equipment to garages.

Pierce, R.S. and Rosen, D.W., “Free-Form Surface Modeling as a Tool for the Analysis and
Selection of Assembly Tolerances,” Proceedings of the 29th International Symposium
on Automotive Technology and Automation, June, 1996.